The misadventures of Trowa Barton, Gundam Pilot
by lilla-bis
Summary: Wartime fic, or how Trowa Barton met Heero Yuy and lived to regret it. Prequel to 196 days. Possibly one sided, crush of a male character on another male character.That is to say Shounen-ai, yaoi.


**Title**: **The misadventures of Trowa Barton, Gundam Pilot.'**

**Pairing**: Trowa Barton and Heero Yuy in no particular order.

**Warnings**: Shounen-ai? Yaoi? Possibly one sided, crush of a male character on another male character. Don't like same sex relationship? Don't read.

Prequel to 196 days. Wartime fic, or how Trowa Barton met Heero Yuy and lived to regret it.

**Betaed** by Kelley (strychnon).

**Disclaimer**: I do not own GW. Wartime fic.

Trowa had used up 674 of his bullets. That left him with 123. Considering the number of mobile suits surrounding him there was no hope in Hell he was just going to be able to walk away from this assault.

Unless of course one of the other pilots did something sufficiently unexpected and inspired enough to work as a distraction. Like get out of his Gundam and flash the Oz soldiers, or something equally creative. All in all, the likelihood of that happening was well below 0.00001.

Basically there was one way through, and that was through the meat grinder. Of course should another one of the other pilots self-destruct first, then Trowa might just manage to scamper out of this commendably well-laid trap with only minor injuries and his Gundam in the one piece. If he were willing to consign one colony at the very least to oblivion and there lay the problem. It sounded like a reasonable trade off: 1 colony for 4 saved Gundams.

The chances of any of that happening weren't too good anyway, from what Trowa inferred in view of the other pilots' behaviour. Quatre for one would surely avoid self-destructing; it might ruin his manicure. All in all that thought might have been slightly too harsh as the boy was not quite that bad. Still someone who would swoon over a fellow pilot and surrender when he was winning didn't seem to be a likely prospect for self sacrificing stoic-ness. 02 seemed a bit too ditzy and short sighted to be able to factor his person and his "partner" as a part of their arsenal. 05 would probably feel that he was not worthy of dying so nobly.

Which left the soldiers: Trowa himself and 01, code name Heero Yuy, as prospective sacrifices. Trowa didn't think it very likely that 01 would take any initiative. From all he had discovered during his infiltration of the Barton foundation, Yuy seemed to be little better than an A.I. with lots of processors in parallel (AKA a brain).

A few minutes and one message from the creepy professor (as Trowa thought of J) and Trowa was ready to hightail it out of the trap as soon as 01 obeyed the given order. Only Yuy did not. Trowa watched, incredulous, as Yuy made his way out of the pilot post onto the hatch of his Gundam. Was getting out of one's Gundam a new trend in piloting mobile suits he hadn't been taught? It still seemed a pretty idiotic move to him.

That was the moment 01 self destructed. Trowa felt that reality was finally getting back on an even keel. Which was a big relief. Soldiers who were ordered to self-destruct should really do so. Actually, standing in the hatch might even have been an inspired choice as it gave the pilot a slim to non-existent chance of survival. Trowa felt he might want to take it into account for himself in the future, if necessary. Right now though, it was high time he used 01's sacrifice to get out of Siberia.

On a whim, possibly out of gratitude, as he later rationalised it, Trowa picked up the body of 01 with Heavyarms. That he managed to make good his escape in spite of that strategic blunder amazed him. Maybe his opponents where not as savvy as Trowa had feared. Should he have tried to call their bluff about the colonies?

Still that Une woman sounded professional enough to go ahead with the menaced destruction. The sacrifice of at least one Gundam had probably truly been called for. Trowa didn't like Une's inconsistent behaviour though. Letting him get away after he had blown his chance by stopping for a corpse, of all things, was not something that the woman who had advocated the massacre of all colonists should have allowed. For that matter Trowa was getting slightly worried about himself; what had he been thinking about to risk himself and his mobile suit for a dead machine... boy... man... whatever?

Trowa gloomily considered, while reapplying bandages to a badly shredded arm on his fellow pilot, that saving the nearly dead Heero had been ill-advised from more than a merely strategic point of view. Not only had Trowa had to dig out 534 bits of shrapnel from the insensate body of 01, which had not been a pleasurable experience, but his guest was also amazingly fine, which was proving to be most unfortunate. Not since he was 13 had Trowa nursed so many Inappropriate Erections.

These days he had to take himself into hand after every bandaging session. Which meant at least once a day. And quite often more as Yuy's wounds tended to bleed heavily.

Trowa was getting worried about his libido. For one thing, he felt that it probably said something about him, his being attracted to a silent, mummy-like, near corpse of a boy... man. He was also pretty sure that said something was unlikely to be a positive reflection on his character. For another, he was all but chafing in a delicate part of his anatomy.

Catherine was proving to be another potential problem. She kept trying to let Yuy die (which had proved to be surprisingly difficult, given his condition) by supposedly forgetting to give 01 his antibiotic shots. Trowa found himself almost admiring her deviousness. And her acting skills. She always seemed genuinely surprised whenever Trowa found the unused syringe in some out of the way place in their shared trailer.

She had also been trying to talk Trowa into abandoning 01 or turning him in. Her justification was that 01 could create plenty of problems for Trowa himself, and the whole of the circus, given that Oz and most of the people with a TV had seen Yuy's face splashed on their screens; it was a logical and well thought out reason. At the same time a trained pilot (with guts and dedication) wasn't a resource Trowa was willing to squander. Also a niggling part of his mind didn't like the idea of having to lay hands on Yuy's body to kill him, death being the only possible way to safely dispose of 01.

Luckily, for all concerned, Catherine seemed to have decided not to turn Trowa (and guest) in herself. That she had been showing signs of affectionate behaviour of the familial kind towards Trowa had also come as a relief. Trowa would have fucked her, had it proved necessary to ensure her loyalty, thus protecting their cover and ensuring their safety. But he really only enjoyed having sex with men. He was glad he had been spared the indignity of fumbling with Catherine on top of the chafing.

Yuy surprised both Catherine (who had been getting more and more chipper as time passed) and Trowa by finally waking up one morning after more than a month of sleep. He proved to be a man of few, direct-to-the-point-of-rudeness, words. Trowa really appreciated the change in pace from his other companion. Catherine could keep up a conversation with 15 mute people.

That Yuy's few words almost contained a joke (about self destruction hurting like Hell granted, but still a joke) was a welcome surprise. There was an unforeseen depth to the Barton's weapons that Trowa found most intriguing. (Almost as intriguing as the changing of the bandages, unfortunately.) Trowa found himself for the first time genuinely admiring a person. Which was a very unfamiliar earth-shattering change of pace for him.

Trowa might have been tempted to initiate a sexual relationship with someone who had so many admirable qualities, on top of that body. But for one thing, Heero's way of demolishing bananas with his teeth whenever Trowa was making a show of eating his sensually was most troubling. For another, Trowa felt morally obliged to finish the mission issued by J. Sex would be an Unwelcome Distraction in view of his having to properly organise his life (end of).

Heero supporting both Trowa's choice to self destruct and his reneging on this initial decision in the aftermath of the whole Catherine-induced debacle, surprised Trowa. It also gave him a vaguely uncomfortable feeling, almost like heartburn in his stomach. Given that Trowa had eaten only wholesome foods it had to be due Yuy behaving with lack of Logical Forethought: one of the cardinal sins in Trowa's eyes. Trowa surprisingly found his esteem of Yuy almost rising after the whole incident.

Yuy's subsequent hunt for assisted suicide, at the hands of the Fort Edwards victim's families, left Trowa feeling peeved (all that time spent digging out shrapnel for this) and (occasionally) despondent. He could get the logical implications behind Heero's choice this time, though. Which sort of made it even more baffling that he should feel even a sliver of regret over the logical conclusion of Heero's acceptance of the mission in Siberia.

There were other worrying reactions Trowa found himself indulging in. Exhibit A: his wish to touch Yuy, and not in the pursuit of sex (which would have been a pointless effort anyway since 01 seemed to be asexual. Some of that programming had apparently stuck.) Exhibit B: his desire to kill Ms Darlian not so much because of her blowing their covers repeatedly, which was a legitimate motivational factor, but rather because of her screech of 'Heero,' all too often disturbingly followed by 'come kill me.' (Was Trowa the only one to approach suicide as a tactical move and not a 'consummation devoutly to be wished'?) Exhibit C: his unreasonable, almost gushing happiness when Yuy found him extra ammunition after his own contacts hadn't come through in Brussels. Trowa loved a man who got him bullets as much as the next door soldier, but he had never, ever, felt the need to smile before. Even worse, he had actually smiled for several seconds. Maybe even a minute. His face had started to hurt, for God's sake!

He was almost about to get seriously worried about his possibly Heero-Yuy-induced illogical behaviour when the idiot went and nearly got himself killed again and this just after regaining his Gundam courtesy of the Lightning Count! (Now that was one serious wack job. Arm your enemies, will you.) At that time Trowa's anger was perfectly justified, and logical.

Watching Yuy fly away in his Gundam, a faint stirring of regret in his chest, Trowa could see a huge nearly blinding silver lining to this separation: surely the Yuy-induced crazy period of his life was finally over.

Hamlet 3/1, W. Shakespeare. (To be or not to be.)


End file.
